Centre Court roof 'will succeed'

A Cornish company, which has helped redevelop Wimbledon, is confident the new retractable roof on Centre Court will be a success.

The roof was first used in May for an exhibition featuring Andre Agassi, Tim Henman, Steffi Graf and Kim Clijsters.

Martin Ayliffe, managing director of Baseline Building Surveyors, told the BBC: "We know it works. [In May] there were 15,000 very happy people here.

"The players coming off court said it was fantastic."

Ayliffe's company, based in Truro, have also been carrying out work in preparation for the 2012 Olympics, as well as working on the new number two court.

The club will then be able to predict when to close the roof to get the conditions absolutely right

Martin Ayliffe

And he said they will now monitor the roof over the next few years.

"The main hub at court one is monitoring every temperature change and what we want to do over a period of years is build a log of how the roof performs under a number of different conditions," he said.

"The club will then be able to predict when to close the roof to get the conditions absolutely right."

But Ayliffe said there are no plans yet to put a roof on court one.

"I'm not picking up vibes at the moment, I think they want to see how that one works first," he added.

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